Archive for the 'Q Tip' Tag Under 'Soundcheck' Category

Pitbull may have been the closer, but A Tribe Called Quest stole the show Saturday night at the H2O Music Festival in downtown Los Angeles – in part because the influential but on-again-off-again hip-hop trio swears it was their final performance ever.

“I know we say this all the time, but this is really our last show,” Q-Tip, arguably the group’s most noted MC (above), told a packed crowd at the event, now in its second year of meshing Latin and English-language acts at the city’s State Historic Park.

And there was no better scene than watching all three (including Ali Shaheed Muhammad) together again, particularly after glimpsing the strife they endured during their reunion at 2008’s Rock the Bells, as documented in the 2011 film Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest. (Occasional fourth member Jarobi White wasn’t present this time.)

If things had gone perfectly to plan, fans attending the 8th annual Rock the Bells festival at San Manuel Amphitheater on Saturday would have witnessed 10 highly regarded albums performed by an equal number of classic artists or groups - a truly epic day for any dedicated hip-hop head.

Rapper Opio, from Souls of Mischief, called it early in the day when he stopped to address the crowd about halfway through the group's seminal debut, 93 'til Infinity: "There's so much good sh** here at Rock the Bells, y'all. You're gonna try and see so much sh** and something's gonna get f***ed-up and you're gonna miss something you wanna see, but you won't even care 'cause it's all so PHAT!"

Nothing could have been more true.

As usual with these events, there were some hiccups in the program. Talib Kweli and Mos Def, set to showcase their highly influential Black Star material, failed to show up for their scheduled appearance. Anyone who waited around for that (with no formal announcement of the cancellation) missed earlier acts including Wu-Tang Clan member Masta Killa and affiliate Killah Priest. Additionally, MF Doom scrubbed his appearance two days before the fest (no surprise there; he's known for backing out), and for some reason Common did not perform Be in its entirety as advertised, though his mash-up of favorites from that album with newer cuts was sharp, smooth and heartfelt as always.